Mr. Varsavsky met over dinner with former President Bill Clinton a couple of days ago in New York, where he had the opportunity to share some of his personal ideas on International Affairs. Topics of discussion included the following: Clinton’s view on a potential Hillary Clinton presidential bid, John McCain, Vladimir Putin, Google and Yahoo in China, the oil prices, elections in the US, school vouchers, public education, health care, Iraq, Iran, Hugo Chavez, the Dubai port issues, Michelle Bachelet, evangelical Christians, and FON.

Giandomenico Picco thinks that the concept of indirect democracy established during the French and the US revolutions is –in many ways– in crisis. The question today is that if the change in the means of communications amongst individuals and the methods of accessing knowledge and information is in fact leading towards a new form of democracy. Mr. Picco believes that electing our representatives is not enough, and the voice through NGOs, media, internet and other forms of social interactions have to count. We will not likely move from the model of indirect to direct democracy in one generation but the knocks on the door will become louder and louder.